


All the Lights

by romickey



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Dead!Nathan, Graduation, Les Mis - Freeform, M/M, Theater AU, Work In Progress, alive!seth, all the foxes are the same age, and its all in arizona, andrew plays trumpet for the pit, bee is the piano lady, dan is the stage director, except nicky, ive never been to arizona can you tell, kevin was not raised by the moriyamas but he's still an anxious perfectionist, nicky gets to be the twins' exhausted single parent, no!riko, so he's a little bit older, theater tech, they get to graduate im looking foward to writing that, wymack is the band teacher
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-13
Updated: 2019-09-12
Packaged: 2020-03-02 19:34:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 18,893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18817573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/romickey/pseuds/romickey
Summary: Neil is seventeen when he finds out his father has been killed by the Hatfords, and his entire world changes in an instant. With no reason left to run, he enrolls in high school and tries to be a normal teenager. He meets the gang in theater club, and learns there might be more to his life than exy and running away.  He might even have a future.





	1. Prologue - The End

**Author's Note:**

> I did theater tech in high school and it was the only thing I genuinely enjoyed about those entire four years. I think Neil would like it too. It takes like two chapters to get to the theater, but we get there i promise:) I'm on tumblr [@romickey.](https://romickey.tumblr.com/)

Neil was at a gas station rest stop in the middle of the Arizona desert when he got the news that his father had been killed. He didn't process it at first. It was a text, and though the wording was as clear as could be, _nathan is dead, killed by my team this morning and taken in by the fbi,_ how could news that life-shattering be trustworthy if it was sent over text? The number was not saved because Neil's phone was a burner, and he didn't recognize the number because it was most definitely also from a burner, but the string of symbols and letters at the end of the text was a signature that Neil remembered better than he remembered his own name. This was from Stuart. This was the truth.

Neil didn't react at first. He just stood in the middle of the aisle and absentmindedly touched a bag of chips, staring down at his phone. It would've been different if he had been in the room to see his father get killed, had watched him receive a bullet to the head, to the chest, hopefully a couple of bullets. Had he been shot? Maybe Stuart had sliced his jugular, and stabbed him in the gut for good measure. There were a thousand ways his father could have died. _His father was dead._ Neil breathed a little ragged and crinkled the chip bag. His father was dead. If this text was to be trusted, and for all Neil knew it was, his father was dead and he was never coming back. 

At that moment all of his finely tuned survival instincts were keeping the tidal wave of emotions from spilling out in public, protecting him so that he could stay unnoticed. He spotted the restroom and headed over. It was single-person and it was empty, so Neil went in and locked the door behind him.

His hand rested on the doorknob, and it was shaking. He tried to take another deep breath but his throat was tight. As much experience as he'd had with pulling himself through horrible situations, he did not have much experience in telling himself he was going to be alright. Because that had hardly ever been true.

He turned on the faucet and tried to be steadied by the white noise. He watched it pour out into the sink and fall back down the drain, wasting it all. He felt like laughing. He should be giddy with joy. His life had just changed, full-stop, with a few words from a text message. But there were those instincts again, and they kept Neil from fully believing, just in case. He turned the faucet off. He shouldn't let his guard down, even now, because he wasn't going to fall for this if it was a trap.

And yet, there was a large part of his rational mind that knew this was true, and that part of him was freaking out.

He squatted on the bathroom floor, pulled the hood of his sweatshirt over his eyes, and held himself. He sat there, repeating to himself the only mantra he knew, _they have not gotten you yet,_ until he felt his breathing calm. Not to normal, but until his throat was no longer too tight to inhale. He took in a deep breath of public bathroom air, and it grounded him. It smelled… not good, per say, but familiar in a way few things did from the transient life he'd lived over the past seven years. Motels, gasoline, and dirty rest stop bathrooms were some of the only constants he knew. It meant being on the road with his mother. Preferably when they weren't actively running from someone. Just continuing on, the two of them against the world.

He had two dead parents now.

He was alone. He was free.

Neil left the bathroom and the gas station, got in his car, and drove away. He checked into a motel, got some food, and screamed and cried and laughed and ran until he was exhausted enough to fall asleep.

It would be many more wide-awake nights, texts from Stuart, seeing the news story on the motel tv, and receiving a picture of his father, bleeding out on the cement floor of their Baltimore basement, before it became real to Neil: his monster was dead, and he could finally stop running.

*********

“So stay put for now, hear me?” Stuart ordered through the burner pressed to Neil’s ear, spotty from the motel reception. “That's all we can let you do, with the state of things being as they are.”

“Yes. I understand,” Neil answered.

“Good. And look…” Stuart paused, then sighed. “I'm sorry it has to turn out like this. I would come and get you if I could, I owe my sister that much, but this is Moriyama business now. I'm not gonna mess with that.”

“I understand,” Neil repeated, stunned to think Stuart would be sorry about any of this. He had killed Nathan. He had freed Neil. 

“This is a dicey situation, and I'm gonna make sure it works out in our favor. Keep your phone on you, and stay low.”

Neil nodded, though Stuart couldn't see it.

“Stay alive, Nathaniel. I'll keep you posted.” With that, Stuart hung up.

Neil closed his phone but didn't move. He just stood there, facing the window that had a wonderful view of the gutter and the 7-Eleven next door, his mind anywhere but. 

So it was real. His father was dead. He could stop running. He couldn't let his guard down completely - Stuart had explained that the Moriyamas didn’t know that he was alive, and that they were also going to be more than a little angry that their Butcher had been killed. Stuart was planning on using Nathan's son as a peace offering, on the condition that they left him in Stuart's custody. Until then, Nathaniel was to stay in hiding just in case - but _in hiding_ was worlds away from _on the run,_ and the difference was enough to make hope flutter in his chest, the first time in a very long while.

 _Nathaniel_. He wondered if he could stop using that name. He’d never thought that the past was something he would ever be able to leave behind, and yet, here he was, on the other side of Nathan's death, alive. Should he be Abram? No, Abram had been buried with Mary in California. He wondered if he could just be Neil. He’d always be Nathaniel to the Hatford clan, and to the Moriyamas, but he wondered. His father was dead. Anything was possible now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soundtrack: [At Least I Have Nothing by Saint Motel](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40XR-A6-e38)


	2. Staying Put

It was an unfamiliar feeling, being in an apartment that was his own. He had lived for so long out of motel rooms and a car, but he figured he might as well rent a real living space, if he was to stay put and all. What was stopping him now?

He took out his new keys and opened the apartment door with care. Others might've called it tiny, but Neil had rarely lived in larger spaces, all those years on the run with his mom. It was surreal, settling down without her. He tapped the doorframe twice as he entered, a salute.

He kept the keys in his hand, twirling the ring around his fingers as he walked through his new space. Everything was off-white, and his sounds echoed off the bare walls. At least there was a bed, because Neil hadn't been planning on buying one. He was already squeamish about using his cache for a down payment on the rent of this place; if his life up until this point had taught him anything, it was to not waste money on things he might need to ditch in the middle of the night. But then again, maybe that way of life was behind him. If he was going to get rid of the paranoia that lived in the back of his head, it was going to take a while. But he wasn't even sure he wanted to. There were still the Moriyamas, after all. 

He flopped down on the mattress and stared up at the ceiling. Afternoon sun slanted over him from the window; the desert heat crept in past the ineffective AC units, and he began to feel drowsy. It had been a long day, getting the logistics of the apartment worked out. The landlord had been unwilling to believe the tales of a roughed-up, sketchy-looking, barely eighteen year old boy, but she had been no match against Neil, who’d been lying since the day he was born. He closed his eyes. There would always be the Moriyamas. _But right now_ , he thought as he drifted into a calm sleep, _they can wait._

*******

Three weeks later, Neil circled the block, memorizing the exits of the school building as he ran around it. Alamosa Springs Upper High School was an unassuming brick and cement building that was nestled neatly in a suburban neighborhood development. Although Neil had picked the town of Alamosa Springs simply because it had been where Neil had gotten the news of his father's death, the location of his apartment had been selected for a reason: he was going back to school.

The concept was strange, as Mary had given up on Neil's public education several years ago. She taught him everything he needed to know, and what he needed to know was wound care, languages, and identity wiping; everything else she considered bullshit. But it was the only thing Neil could think of to do with his new life. School was vaguely familiar, and right now familiar was something Neil was scrambling to hold onto. Stuart had agreed that it was a good idea, a way to stay put and be traceable by the Moriyamas, and so in two weeks, Neil would be a senior in high school. He had already taken placement tests and was put into remedial classes, but at least he'd made it into his age group. That was the strangest part of all - the thought of being surrounded by kids his own age. Socializing with them, being a normal teenager. Neil would never be a normal teenager, but he knew that.

He was going to have to do his running earlier in the morning - it was already getting too hot, damn desert climate. He stopped to stretch on the bleachers in the football field. It was quiet, the bleachers shining silver in the morning sunlight, and for the first time in a while Neil thought about Exy. Nathan's death had been so dramatic that it had pushed aside all else from his mind, but he was coming back down from that now. Exy. He hadn't played in years, but just being around a school environment was bringing those memories back. Something fierce in him yearned to be back with the weight of a racquet in his hands, a clear goal in sight, and the energy of a close game channeling his anxiety into something productive. Exy had been his only real source of enjoyment in those early years, before Mary had taken away all the remaining normalcy in Neil's life. After that it had just been paranoia, and devolving, and run. 

Jesus, he had a lot to recover from.

He sat down on the bleachers and watched the as the day began.

*******

School was unsettling.

Here he was, in a crowded public space, where he told his teachers his full name, where he put his birthday (fake) and address (real, for now) on file with the administration, and where hundreds of other kids his age did the same without seeing anything terrifying about it. He had been repeating his name in his head all day so that _Stephan_ or _Chris_ or _Nathaniel_ didn't accidentally slip out. He'd stuttered when his first period teacher had asked him if "Neil" was a nickname - he had been so focused on getting out a "no" that he knew he looked strange to his classmates. He had just been desperately trying to keep himself from saying "yes." In any case, Neil wasn't concerned with making friends, at least not yet.

Classes seemed like they'd be fine. Neil wasn't sure what his future was going to look like, but he was going to try and do well nonetheless. Apparently it was a first-day-of-school-thing in every class to do "ice breakers," where he was supposed to share personal details about his life simply for the enjoyment of others. Neil mostly stuck with safe, vague answers, and so people for the most part ignored him.

But the strangest part of the whole thing was how much of a bubble school was. During these eight hours of the day, his whole world was a tightly run schedule of classes and assignments and the same group of strangers, all his age. Teachers preached at him that it was the most important thing in the world. And then the bell rang for the end of the day, and it was back to the real world. That used to mean back to fighting for his life. In the old days he had been a bad student simply because his priority had never been school - it had been staying alive. The end of the school day meant going back to Mom and praying that she wasn't already dead, hoping that there wasn't one of his father's men waiting for him just inside the door. But that wasn't his life anymore. If Stuart was able to get him the Moriyamas' approval, technically he'd be free. School could be his real world. He could come home at 2:30, listen to music in his car, do his homework, maybe read a book. Theoretically, he could even join an Exy league. But that approval wasn't secure yet, and so for now he waited, alone in his apartment, phone by his side in case he needed to run.

*******

On the Friday night after his first week back at school, Neil went on a night run to shake out his tense mood. The pavement radiated heat from the day, and he was probably getting mosquito bites, but running was always worth it.

The streetlamps gave off golden patches of light that Neil followed as a path through the darkness. As his feet pounded the pavement, he tried to let his thoughts wander, but his paranoia had come back in full force with the start of school. Being in crowded public spaces would be ok if he was invisible, anonymous - but here he was revealing his identity on purpose, even if some of it was fake. It went against all his instincts; it went against everything his mother had taught him. Everything she had _died_ for. If she could see him now… Guilt only amplified his anxiety. He kept running.

Something moved in the corner of Neil's vision - he flinched as his heart jump-started. He moved out of the pool of golden light and jogged alongside it in the dark, looking across the street to the other suburban houses, behind them, even further back to the scraggly pine trees. It was probably nothing. An animal in the brush, or something. He tried to bring his breathing back to the steady pace of running.

A shot rang out from the next street over, and Neil dropped to the sidewalk. His pulse pounded in his ears and shook him all over, so much so that it took him several seconds to match the sound to a car that was pulling out of its driveway. It had just been the ignition. Neil stayed on the cement as he watched the car, its headlights sweeping over the houses around him. It turned down the street and disappeared into the dark, the motor humming softly.

Neil sat up, cursing his strung-out imagination. Once he had caught his breath, he stood up and tried to get back into his rhythm, but it wasn't working. He was shaking with adrenaline, and it was only increasing the longer he stayed out here in the dark. _No more night runs_ , he decided. He was jogging as he headed back towards his apartment, but it grew to a full-on sprint by the time he reached the building.

He slowed to a walk as he climbed the stairs so as not to look suspicious. He made it to his apartment, quickly shut the door behind him, locked the locks, then unlocked and locked them again. He took a couple breaths, none of them very deep, and slumped against the wall.

In the early days of being on his own after Mary's death, he would leave the TVs on in the motels he stayed in. It was comforting to hear the sounds of people talking, laughing - it had eased his paranoia to feel like he wasn't alone. His apartment hadn't come with a TV, but Neil wouldn't have turned it on anyway. These days he needed to be able to hear people coming. It was deadly quiet now.

He struggled through the routine of getting ready for sleep, and when he finally made it to his bed he took his gun out of the drawer and held it to him as he laid down. It took him forever, but finally Neil fell asleep, curled around the comforting weight of the gun in his hand, covers strewn around in the dark, alone in his one-room apartment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hopefully this wasn't too much summary/context; I'm still trying to figure out the balance. But next chapter we start meeting the foxes, beginning with Dan and Matt!
> 
> Soundtrack - [Lessons by SOHN](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e17iXDf0NGE) (watch the music video, it seriously has such a neil vibe)


	3. New Things

School soon grew to be routine. It was as tedious and ridiculous as he'd remembered it being, and also as blissfully normal as he'd hoped it'd be. He still had not heard any news from Stuart, so he just kept going.

His classmates pretty much left him alone. Neil was focused on doing his work as he had a lot to make up for, and most of the other kids didn't seem to care much about schoolwork. Neil understood, but it made him a bit of a loner in his classes. At this point, he didn't mind - he was even comforted by it. This was familiar. Yet sometimes when he had his head down doing algebra problems or a lab summary or busy work, he listened to the kids who knew each other so well, who laughed and complained and gossiped with each other easily, and he kind of wished he could have some of that for once.

And maybe he would, if Dan and Matt had any say in it.

They were just two kids in his study hall, but they had very pro-actively made themselves Neil’s friends, after they'd seen him sitting alone that first day and had asked to join. Neil genuinely had no idea why they went out of their way to be nice to him, but he wasn’t complaining. He could tell even after only having known them for a month or so that they were good people.

Today that study hall fell to the last period of the day and Neil walked into the classroom, seeing Dan and Matt already there, waving him over to their table with smiles on their faces. Neil couldn’t help himself - he smiled back, then headed over, setting his backpack down next to theirs.

“Heya, Neil!” Matt said, getting out his math homework and putting it on the table.

“Hi,” said Neil back.

“Neil, oh my god - I’ve thought of the perfect way for you to make more friends here,” Dan announced without preamble, putting both hands on the table, braids cascading over her shoulder. She and Matt had been brainstorming schemes for expanding Neil’s social life for a while now; Neil had rejected most of them on principle, and he was interested in hearing what Dan thought would be the winning idea. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of it before. You should join drama.”

“Damn, babe, that’s such a good idea!” Matt agreed, looking at Neil expectantly. “We’re both in it - I’m an actor and she’s the stage manager. That’s perfect: you’d get to hang out with us, and you’d already know two people there, so you wouldn’t feel awkward!”

Neil was amused, but there was a major flaw in this plan. “Thanks, but you are _never_ getting me onstage, no matter how nicely you ask.” With his paranoia? He’d probably start seeing the Moriyamas in the audience.

Dan wasn’t fazed in the slightest. “That’s fine - I’m never onstage: you can do tech with me!”

“Oh yeah, I can totally see Neil in tech," said Matt. Neil didn't know if that was supposed to be a complement or not. He didn't have the first clue as to how theater worked. Plus, he usually refuted these ideas as a default. He appreciated the kindness, but it just wasn’t a priority at the moment, and his instincts were great at immediately finding reasons to say no.

“I’ve never done it and I’m already a senior."

“So what?” Dan responded, a fierce and eager opponent to Neil’s pessimism. “Everyone starts with no experience, and there are lots of people who don’t join until their last year.”

Neil searched for another excuse. “I don’t know, it sounds like it’d take up a lot of time.” Even as he said it he saw himself sitting alone in his apartment every day after school, making the only five meals he knew how to make, watching his phone out of the corner of his eye, waiting for news.

“Tech week can be pretty intense, but that’s what, two, three weeks out of the whole year?" Dan answered, shrugging. "It's not too much to handle. There are even people who do theater and sports. Once you're in it you won't want to leave."

Neil was grasping at straws now. “What if I don’t like the plays you’re doing.” 

Dan grinned, knowing she was finally wearing him down. “I was under the impression you didn’t know enough about theater for that to be a dealbreaker for you. Plus, for tech it doesn’t matter as much because it’s not like you’re choosing a character to play. But I’m pretty sure we’re doing Les Mis for the spring musical, if that’s up to your standards,” she said, playfully sarcastic.

No other arguments came to mind. He made a point of not looking at Dan as he got out his homework and pretended to start it.

“Ooh, I think I got him!” she boasted, shaking Matt’s arm beside her in triumph. Neil gave her a look. “Sorry,” she said, bringing herself down, but still smiling. “I’m not trying to make you do something that’s uncomfortable, but I really think it would help you. Friends aside, it’s so much fun!” She looked to Matt. “Do I or do I not try to recruit everyone to drama?” 

“Everyone cool, yeah,” Matt agreed. “It’s an intense couple weeks, but they’re probably the best weeks out of the school year. You should definitely join.”

“Or just try it out!” Dan added. “Just come to our first meeting where we talk about our plans and you get to meet everyone. No commitment at all!” Neil sighed. She was a great salesperson, and he was out of excuses.

“I guess I could go to the first meeting. If it would make you that happy,” Neil finally conceded. He meant it. It would actually feel nice to make her happy.

Dan grinned big and mischievous. “Great. It’s today, after school. We’ll escort you to the auditorium and everything!”

Neil rolled his eyes, but smiled despite himself.

*********

After school ended, Neil indeed found himself in the school's auditorium, sitting in the front row next to Matt as he watched Dan get situated on a stool up front and greet everyone who filtered in. On their way over from study hall, the two of them had explained to Neil a little of how theater worked, like what the different jobs were, how long it took to prepare a production for opening night, and so on. Neil had learned that as the stage manager, Dan was the right hand to the director and in charge of giving the tech crew their cues, so that the whole production moved smoothly. The actors were under the training of the director, and the crew followed the lead of the tech director and stage manager together. There were lighting and sound board operators, stage hands, props and costume people… Dan and Matt explained as much as they thought they could get away with without scaring Neil off. He noticed that they got particularly heated when talking about budget cuts and how the school administration clearly prioritized the football and sports teams over the arts. It was clear they both cared deeply about the theater program at the school, and that alone piqued Neil's interest. He wondered what they loved about it so much.

Apparently everyone who was coming had arrived, because a red-headed woman stood up in front, waved her hands, and said, "Thanks to everyone who made it here today, I'm really looking forward to everything we've got planned for this upcoming year. I'm Abby Winfield for those who don't already know; you can call me Abby. I'm the director of the theater program here at Alamosa. Should we go around and introduce ourselves for the people that are new? Let's say your name, class year, and what you do here."

"And a fun fact!" Matt added from the audience, waggling his eyebrows at Abby.

"Sure, Matt, and a fun fact," she conceded, shaking her head at him and smiling. It was clear to Neil that they had a history with each other. He could hardly imagine staying in once place long enough to have something like that.

Dan started it off, giving a little wave. "Hey guys, I'm Dan, I'm the stage manager here, I’m a senior, and a fun fact…" she tapped her chin, "my other hobby is dance, I guess. I tend to help out Abby a lot with choreography, so even if you're an actor you'll probably be seeing a lot of me."

She gestured to a guy with dark hair and intense eyes sitting next to her, and he gave a nod to the group. "Hello, I'm Kevin, the tech director and lighting designer. I'm a senior and I'm excited to make my last year here our best yet." He looked like he was done talking, but Dan glared at him. "What?" he said.

"Fun fact?"

"Oh, well, I'm pretty sure I'm going to make valedictorian this year."

"Oh my god." Dan put her head in her hand. 

"What?" Kevin repeated indignantly.

"That's not fun."

Kevin sighed. "Fine. My... favorite subject is history. Is that better?"

"Not really, but sure," said Dan, and some of the audience members smirked.

After that, people in the audience spoke up and introduced themselves as actors or as part of the tech crew, and Neil had to admit they seemed like a fun-loving group of friends. When it came around to Neil, he said "I’m Neil, and I'm just looking." He'd had enough of introducing himself, but Dan smiled in his direction to show that she was proud. As the group discussed the potential choices for the fall play and their big plans for the spring musical, Neil felt himself getting a little caught up in their excitement. He didn't want to admit defeat and let Dan manipulate him into socializing, but maybe he could actually benefit from this. From having a hobby, from having a group of people to ground him outside his apartment. Maybe it’d be nice.

The meeting didn’t last too long, and pretty soon most people packed up and left for the day. Matt stayed seated, deep in an animated conversation with a tall blonde girl in a pink hoodie sitting next to him; they were excitedly discussing a TV show Neil had never seen. Dan waved goodbye to Abby heading out the side door, and then walked over to plop down in the seat next to Neil.

“Sooo,” she started, “what did you think? Did we convince you how much fun you’d have here?”

Neil shrugged. “I guess I’ll think about it.”

Dan looked shocked, like she hadn’t really expected him to say that. “Oh wow, did I finally do it? Alright!” She reined in her enthusiasm to clarify, more seriously, “I’d really love it if you did, but it’s totally up to you - remember that.” She added, “Though you know, an extracurricular would look great on your college applications! There’s always that.” 

Neil snorted, and Dan's expression grew more serious. “What, you’re not applying to college? I mean, that’s totally your choice, but if you’re writing it off as too expensive I can give you tips! I’m relying 100% on scholarships and a part-time job but I’m still making it happen.”

“Thanks, it’s not that,” he said, and then decided to try out a bit of honesty. “It’s just...I’ve always had too much going on in my life to even think about college.” It felt nice, even if it was vague; Dan deserved it for being so thoughtful.

“Oh, I _get_ that,” Dan responded. “My house gets so dramatic sometimes, it’s crazy. Too many people coming in and bringing all their issues with them.” She shook her head. “If you ever want help learning about the process or where to start, let me know. If I can do it, so can you.”

Neil didn’t know what to say. He didn’t know what he was going to do about his future, or how much of a say he’d get in it. He had never considered college mostly because he had fully expected [to be dead by now](https://twitter.com/nocontxtmulaney/status/1081678289184251904). “Thanks. If I decide to, that’d be really nice.”

Dan smiled warmly. “I know me and Matt came on strong to you, Neil, but if you do join drama, I hope we can be real friends. You’re sweet, and I hate seeing people be lonely.” With that she stood up and reached over Neil to bother Matt. “Baby, you’re driving me home right? Time to go.”

Matt looked up at her and said “Ugh, fine, Mom,” but he grabbed his backpack and stood up.

“Oh no, do not start calling me ‘Mom,’” she exclaimed, “That's _nasty._ ”

Matt laughed as he moved past Neil, and he put his arm around Dan’s shoulder. “Whatever you say, Mom.” 

She pushed him off playfully, saying to the blonde girl, “You see what I have to put up with?”

The girl smirked. “If Matt’s up for grabs, I will happily put in an application.”

“Thanks, Allison,” Matt responded, a hand over his heart. “That means a lot.”

The two of them finally left, saying goodbye to Allison and then to Neil, and Neil got up to leave as well. As he walked out the door and headed down the sidewalk on his way home, he thought. Maybe...maybe he would like this after all. 

He'd probably go to the next meeting, just in case.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> aright, now we can get going
> 
> soundtrack - [The Tony Award Song from [Title of Show]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bY9YIlKHVjg)


	4. Saturdays

Two Saturdays later it was the middle of October, though it wasn't getting much colder in Arizona. Neil had mostly lived in northern states and countries, so the perpetual heat was a novel thing to him - at least for the time being. He still had to go for his runs at the crack of dawn, and as he was came back from today’s, he was quite sweaty and headed straight for the shower. 

Once he was done, he dried off his wet hair and inspected it in the mirror. He had about a half inch of rusty auburn hair coming through, and usually at this point he would be rushing to the drugstore to buy some black box dye. But today...he didn't feel as motivated. Honestly, he was tired of the whole hair business. He reflexively glanced at his phone on the bedside table. Still nothing. The Moriyamas already knew who he was, who he looked like. Right now, maybe he'd just let grow it out. He arranged his new hair in the mirror and fought the instinct to see the red roots as something to be fixed. He did put in his contacts though. Getting to the point where he could look at his true eyes would take much more time.

Neil flopped down on his bed and stared at the ceiling. It was peaceful for a moment, but then he got bored and reached over for his phone. He opened the calendar function and checked today's date - yes, today was indeed the day of the first theater tech build. Dan had told him that “builds” were usually for making sets and props, as well as setting up lights and sound, but that at their first one they'd probably be doing small things, like painting posters, or talking about design. She'd also made fun of his phone when she saw him putting the date into his calendar; he hadn't paid much attention. As burners went, it was a pretty nice one - it had a slide keyboard and everything. It was no smartphone, but wasn't like Neil had ever considered those to be a thing he would ever need or want.

This was the turning point. If he went to this meeting, he might as well just commit to the whole thing. They'd for sure give him a job and expect him to be able to do it for the next couple weeks, until the fall play at least. Dan would be so proud of him, and he'd get to hang out with her and Matt. But if he didn’t go, Dan would be very polite and accepting of him needing his space, and she wouldn't push for him to be social again. He could spend the rest of the day here in his apartment, doing his homework, maybe going to the grocery store to stock up on food, or the car shop to get a replacement taillight. Yeah, he had chores he could do; he could keep himself busy.

He sighed, then got up, put on a shirt he didn't mind getting paint on, and walked out the door, heading down the sidewalk toward the school.

*******

He approached the door to the band hallway and saw the very corner of it propped open with a music stand. He figured that meant he was in the right place, so he opened the door and went in.

Inside, he heard voices from down the hall, and walked in their direction. He turned the corner and there was Dan, along with that blonde girl Allison, and another girl Neil had never met, all of them in the middle of the tiled floor with a huge length of poster paper and some cans of paint between them. "Hello," he said as an introduction.

Dan looked to him and her face lit up. "Neil! I'm so glad you came! Come sit, come sit, you can help with our painting!" she said, gesturing to an open spot across the poster paper from her. Neil sat, and Dan introduced him to the other two. "This is Neil; he’s new to the school this year and I managed to rope him into doing drama, so be nice to him - I don't want him to leave." 

He exchanged polite smiles with the others and grabbed a paintbrush. They were painting a big poster that they would be putting out in front of the school which announced the name and dates of the play. Speaking of, Neil found out that it was something called “The Complete Works of William Shakespeare: Abridged.” Needless to say, there were a lot of letters to paint. Neil had never actually read any Shakespeare - he had probably missed those sections in school - but Dan assured him that the play was a comedy and that the jokes would be funny even if you didn’t get the Shakespeare references. He slowly worked on the “William” as he listened to the girls’ conversation. 

“Does this stuff wash off of the floor?” Allison asked, looking warily at the amount of space between the can of paint and the poster.

Dan shrugged. “Want to find out?”

“Guess I’m being careful then.” Allison cupped her hand under the paintbrush as she brought it quickly back to the paper. “Wymack would _kill_ me if I got paint on his band hallway.”

“Oh, I’m sure he would understand,” said the girl next to Dan. She had impressively dyed hair, a sort of silver-to-rainbow fade, and gave Allison a kind smile. “You’re too sweet for him to be mean to you.”

Neil thought he saw Allison blush; she studied her lettering and said, “You just think that because you’re his favorite.”

“Well, maybe.” 

“You _are_ his favorite, it’s because you’re so good,” Dan added, elbowing the girl encouragingly. “Renee plays the drums,” she told Neil. “She’s our drummer for the musical and she fucking kills it.”

Now Renee was blushing. “Thanks guys, you’re too nice.” Neil had to admit, Renee came across as a bit too gentle and soft-spoken to ‘kill it’ on a heavy-duty instrument like the drums, but he also knew how appearances were often deceiving. He made a mental note to watch for her.

“But yeah,” Dan agreed, “As much as Wymack loves Abby and the theater department, he would be pissed if we messed up his hallway. So be careful.”

“Is he still directing the pit in the spring?” Allison asked.

“I’d think so,” Renee answered. “Why do you ask?”

“Oh, I just remember he had a lot of people to deal with last year. I thought maybe he’d want to take a break.”

“He didn’t have _a lot of people_ to deal with,” Dan said, “he had _the twins_ to deal with.” At that Renee seemed to stiffen; she gave Dan a look. 

“Sorry,” Dan said, but kept going. “I know Andrew’s your friend, but it’s true. In fact, Andrew’s more of a problem than Aaron is, because at least Aaron can sometimes be reasoned with. No one gets Andrew to do anything - it doesn’t matter how nicely we ask. How can you put up with him?” she asked Renee, getting visibly frustrated just talking about it.

Renee remained poised. “I don’t put up with him. We have a lot in common, and I give people second chances. He’s been through a lot, you know.”

“Yeah, well we’ve all been through a lot,” Dan huffed. “He doesn’t have to make everyone else’s lives more difficult because of it.”

“Well, Wymack knows how to handle him, and if he ever does anything like that again this year, you can send him to me.” Even though Neil didn’t know the people they were talking about, he admired Renee’s loyalty: he could see her “heavy-duty” strength in it.

Dan barely concealed her pout. “They’re doing drama _again_ this year?” she whined.

“Dan!” Allison pleaded, glancing at Renee’s resolute stare.

Renee said, “Yes, and I expect you to treat them with kindness. They need it.” Neil got the feeling she didn’t get angry easily. She probably never needed to raise her voice, because she had everyone’s respect already. “Andrew will be coming to some of these builds as part of his community service, and I hope you will be courteous to him, even if he doesn’t return the favor.”

Dan eventually gave a small nod, then went back to her painting. After a moment, she said, “Sorry, Renee. I’ll try, I promise.”

Renee gave a satisfied smile. “Thank you.”

“For you - I’m trying for you,” Dan clarified.

“Whatever it takes,” Renee said, still looking pleased. 

They all went back to painting, and eventually they got to trading small talk again. Even Neil contributed a bit, mostly when it was about a teacher or class they all shared. But he did wonder who Andrew was, and if he was going to be a threat. The words “community service” had immediately set off Neil’s warning bells. Neil could sometimes be known to start fights he wasn’t suited for actually _fighting_ , and he didn’t like the idea of adding someone with a rap sheet into that mix.

Just as he was starting to really get into the rhythm of his letters, that guy from the intro meeting, Kevin, came around the corner and asked, “Are you guys almost done? I need to start training Neil.”

Neil didn’t know what he was talking about, and he looked to Dan. “We’re almost done here,” she said to Kevin. “He can go with you now.” To Neil she said, “You mentioned that you’d want to do tech if you joined drama, so I let Kevin know that he’d probably be able to use you as an assistant. Hope that’s ok!” She made a thumbs up.

Neil shrugged. “Sure.” He didn’t care much either way, but he didn’t know how he felt about Dan volunteering him.

He got up to follow Kevin, and Dan called after them, “If he’s being a dick, Neil, just let me know! I’ll come deal with him for you!”

Kevin shook his head as they walked down the hallway back towards the auditorium. “She’s on me about every little thing, I swear.” 

“Is she a good stage manager?” Neil found himself asking as he followed Kevin through the auditorium doors into the cool, dark space. Kevin immediately went to a little booth in the back, far from the stage.

“Oh, she’s great,” Kevin answered. “She’s just a bit of a control freak. But that’s probably why she’s so good at it. She keeps people in line.” He pushed some sliders on a board, and hidden lights all over the auditorium came on at once.

“So,” he said, turning to Neil. “I could use an assistant up here in tech. I won’t train you on the light board because you’ll be graduating next year and there’d be no point, and this year you’ll probably end up being a stagehand most of the time, but we have things you could help us with up here. Are you game? Will you flake out on me? Dan said you weren’t sure if you were going to commit.”

“Uh, yeah, sure.” Kevin was talking about it like it was a Very Important Thing, like there was a possibility that Neil could betray him. He clarified, “Yes, I’m gonna keep doing it. I won’t ‘flake out.’” But he thought about the phone in his pocket, of the Hatfords and the Moriyamas somewhere on the other end. “Not on purpose, at least.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Kevin said, crossing his arms. 

“Oh - nothing. I moved here recently, and there’s a small chance I might need to... move, again.” He saw Kevin’s suspicious look and tried to reassure him. “It’s not a big chance.”

He didn’t look entirely satisfied, but at that moment the doors opened and someone else was heading up towards the booth. Kevin looked to them and said, “About time Seth. Thought you weren’t going to show up.” 

The boy, Seth, just gave Kevin the finger. He reached the booth and slung his backpack off, throwing his hands in the pockets of a gray jacket that was too big for him. “Well I’m here now. What are we doing?”

“This is Neil.” Kevin motioned to Neil. “He’s going to be our booth assistant this year, so you can give him a job if you want. Besides that, we need to fix our wiring: the teacher training this summer messed it all up.”

“Ugh, I forgot about that,” Seth said, frowning out at the stage. “I’m gone for one minute and everything goes to shit.” He got up on the low shelf that was holding a massive mixer board and reached around its back, pulling out handfuls of wires at a time. “You can test the batteries if you want something to do, Neil.”

“That’s busy work,” Kevin protested. “You got anything more useful?”

“Nothing he’d know how to do,” Seth answered. “And it’s not busy work: it needs to get done eventually, unless you want to buy a shit ton of new batteries.”

“Fine. Here, Neil,” Kevin grumbled as he reached down and got a cardboard box that was filled to the brim with AA batteries. He handed it to Neil along with a little plastic rectangle with a red and a black wire hanging off of it; Neil took them both. The box of batteries was very heavy. “We have to figure out which ones are still charged enough to be able to use. During shows, we throw all the used mic batteries in here because we can’t risk using old ones - they might suddenly run out of power, and then the mics would go out on stage. But they’re definitely not all used up, and we need to find the ones that are still good.”

Neil moved out of their way and made a space for himself on the carpeted floor of the booth. Kevin showed him that the red and black wires corresponded to the positive and negative ends of the battery, and once they touched each end, the meter on the rectangle would show if the battery was charged or not. Neil got to work, slowly accumulating piles of good batteries and bad batteries beside him. He didn’t mind busy work. He had enough real stress in his life; it was nice to do something a little mindless once in a while.

He was getting into the groove of it when Seth looked down at him from atop the shelf and said, “You talk, Neil?”

Neil looked up at the lanky boy. He was wearing a dark colored beanie so low on his head that it almost covered his sunken eyes. Seth was dressed the way Neil had been for most of his life on the run. To be fair, his clothes weren’t much better now that he’d settled, but he’d at least ditched the heavy stuff because of the heat. In any case, being called out for being quiet always put him on edge. “Yeah. Are you asking a question?”

Seth shrugged. “You just hadn’t said anything. Wanted to make sure.”

Kevin was adjusting the lights on the other side of the booth, but he looked over to glare at the other boy. A few more moments went by, and then Seth asked, “So where are you from?”

Neil was immediately on the defensive again. "Why is that important?"

Seth held up his hands. "Whoa. Just trying to get to know you. Didn't know that was a sensitive subject."

Neil could tell both boys were giving him a funny look, and he avoided eye contact. But Seth didn’t quit; after a moment he tried again. "Well, maybe I can start with what grade are you in? I'll go first - I'm a junior. What about you, Neil?"

Maybe if Neil answered his questions he'd lay off. "Senior."

"Ok, good to know," Seth said to him slowly, like he was a child, or a skittish animal. Neil guessed he kind of was like a skittish animal sometimes. "What do you like to do? I mostly like doing sound and audio stuff. I'm in the audio engineering class, the one that Wymack teaches, so I guess I'm not one to talk about having hobbies. But that's what people ask right? When they're being polite?" He looked to Kevin for support, but Kevin wasn't looking at him. Seth frowned.

Neil offered the only thing that came to mind. “Uh... I like Exy. I used to play it but I haven’t in a while.”

Seth's expression fell. "Oh no," he said, looking back at Kevin, who had perked up as soon as Neil had said the word 'Exy.' "Oh God, this is what I get for trying to be social. Jesus Christ, here we go."

“You like Exy?" Kevin asked, immediately turning his attention to Neil. "Do you follow it at the college level?”

“Yeah. I like the Jackals," Neil responded truthfully, "though the Foxes have really been moving up this year.”

“Surprisingly, yeah they have,” Kevin said. “I’m more of a Trojans fan myself, and since they’re in different divisions I haven’t been too worried about them. But it is getting close.” Apparently they had something in common.

“Oh, I think the Trojans should be more worried about that backliner they just recruited. He’s gonna drag them down. Either that or the Ravens - they’re doing better than ever this season.” 

“You like the Ravens? I don’t follow them if I can help it - I’ve heard sketchy things about their coach and how they train, even at the undergrad level.” 

“Well, maybe they do so well because they’re trained so hard. I just like their performance - they pull some crazy moves, and their coordination is amazing.”

“You guys gonna keep going?” Seth asked, watching them with growing annoyance. “‘Cuz I’ll go do sound stuff somewhere else.”

Kevin just looked at him, so Seth huffed in exasperation and grabbed an armful of wires. “Ok, then.” He made off towards the stage, but Kevin didn’t pay him any attention.

The two of them chatted about everything Exy for quite a while, and before Neil knew it he had finished sorting the batteries. Seeing it done, Kevin got back to business, and he assigned Neil to moving a couple of speakers from the booth onto the stage, where Seth was setting up the sound system. Neil did, lugging the 30-odd pound speaker with him and moving around Dan and the girls, who were now bringing large wooden panels out of the backroom storage and onto the stage. When he passed them he caught a snippet of their conversation: Renee was apparently reading her text messages and telling Dan “don’t be _weird_ to him,” but he didn’t catch who they were talking about. 

He was on his second trip with the other speaker (or rather, “ _monitor_ ” as Seth had pointedly corrected him) when the noise of a door opening came from far backstage, and someone started coming their way. As Neil pulled the monitor up the steps, he could see that that someone was a blond young man wearing all black. Neil watched as he went straight to Renee and handed her a textbook. Renee put it under her arm and said to him “Thank you, I really looked everywhere for mine but couldn’t find it,” with a genuine smile. Neil passed by the two of them, and he noticed that the boy was even shorter than he was. He managed to get a glance at him, and he noticed what looked like black armbands under a long-sleeved black sweater. It seemed like a little much for the climate of the place, and Neil wondered if he was hiding anything under there – that’s what he would do, at least.

When he was setting the monitor into place on the other side of the stage, he heard Dan saying “Andrew, _hi_.” Maybe she thought she sounded friendly, but that wasn’t how it came out. Neil looked back and studied the scene again. So that was Andrew. This short, blond goth had not been what Neil had pictured when he was considering someone with a rap sheet and a debt to the community, but as he watched Andrew’s controlled body language, the way he succinctly ignored Dan to give a nod to Renee, and then briskly start to walk away, Neil began to see it. 

Neil was about to turn around, so as to not look like he was staring, when he noticed Andrew make eye contact with Kevin back at the booth. Kevin was standing still, facing the stage from a distance, presumably looking back at Andrew. It was only for a second, but that was enough to tell Neil that there was some sort of history between them. Andrew didn’t register any emotion on his face, and he turned around and left, not saying a word to anyone.

Neil went back to minding his own business. He would keep an eye on this Andrew, though, if they were to be in the same space for any extended period of time. Neil didn’t need another dangerous enemy - that was for sure. 

Once he was done helping Seth, he went over to help the girls with their sets, and pretty soon he forgot all about Andrew and whatever threat he might pose. He let himself get distracted by all the talk about designing the props, set pieces, and costumes, and he spent the rest of the day into the afternoon not worrying about anything other than which shade of blue paint was perfect for this particular piece of sky in the mural.

******

Neil was in an unusually good mood as he headed back to his apartment, the sun radiant as usual in the afternoon sky and the dusty air warm on his skin, so of course that was when his phone began to ring.

Neil's stomach immediately dropped and his body filled with adrenaline. Stuart would text if it was a small update. A call meant big news. A call meant _the_ news.

He froze for a moment on the sidewalk, and then realized there was a very good chance he might need to run as soon as he heard what Stuart had to say. There was no time to waste. He scrambled to get his burner out of the drawstring bag on his back, and as soon as he grabbed it he pressed it to his ear. "Yes?"

"Nathaniel? It's Stuart." Neil's heart's pounding shook his whole body. "The Moriyamas have reviewed the offer I made them, and they've decided to accept." Neil didn’t remember what that meant. Luckily Stuart clarified: "You're good. You're safe to stay in Alamosa. You don't have to run. Nathaniel, can you hear me?"

Neil was still shaking, and he didn't quite know how to react. Somewhere in the distance his brain was trying to process the meaning behind the words _you're safe_ , but right now he needed more answers. "What is the offer they've accepted? Do I work for them now?"

"Well, not entirely. They have accepted you as payment in exchange for their Butcher, but you are not to replace him in that role." Neil's blood went cold. He hadn't known anything like that had even been on the table. He struggled to picture any version of reality where he’d have to consider that as a possibility for survival. "They will come up with a way for you to be a worthy investment to them. They are going to let me know when they do, and it most likely won't take long. Until then, I trust I don't have to tell you not to run. They would not take that kindly."

"Yes, I...that's fine. Thank you!" Neil sputtered out. "Stuart, thank you for working this out on my behalf. I…”

"Like I said, I owe my sister this much," he assured Neil. A moment of static passed, then he said, "How, how is your school?" 

Neil hadn't been expecting that, but he said, "It's fine. It's close to my apartment; I'm doing well enough in my classes." He assumed Stuart wasn't asking about his personal life, so he left out the theater club part.

"Hm. Good," he affirmed. The line crackled again. "Well, keep at it. It might prove useful. Talk to you soon, Nathaniel." And with that, he hung up.

Neil watched the call end on his phone, then let his arm fall back down. He didn't have to leave Alamosa, or his apartment, or his new friends. He...was going to be ok? There was still the ominous specter of uncertainty looming behind him - it could turn out that the Moriyamas had something less than savory in mind as Neil's payment, and he didn't like the idea of him as their "investment," but still… it did feel like it was probably going to be alright. Stuart at least seemed to think so, and that meant something, as he lived a life just as full of paranoia as Neil did. Neil took a deep breath, let it out, and put his phone in his pocket.

He put one foot in front of the other, feeling the weight of each step against the pavement. So this was what not running felt like. He made his way through the late afternoon, taking his time, on the path back towards home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember in the first book when Neil and Andrew thought they'd be a threat to each other? Little did they know they wouldn't be fighting each other, but fighting _for_ each other... 
> 
> :)
> 
> Soundtrack - [All the Time by Bahamas](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8t2H1Ke4MXE)


	5. Changes

It wasn’t easy to wait for the Moriyamas to decide his fate for him, but Neil kept himself busy with schoolwork and theater, the latter of which he could admit that he actually really liked. To do something just for the fun of it ...well, he hadn’t done that for a very long time. Was this what healthy, normal kids' lives were like? Were there times when they weren’t strategizing for safety, always keeping in mind the worst case scenario? Neil could barely imagine that people lived like that, but they must exist.

He went to builds every weekend without fail. Along with the tech regulars and some of the actors, Neil helped construct a set, got the lighting and sound systems into place, and hung posters for the show all over the school. Tech week, which was the week of rehearsals leading up to opening night, wasn’t far off, and in study hall Matt updated him and Dan about the actors’ progress, how close they were to being off-book and ready to put it all together. It was getting exciting - Neil was excited for something. When he was little, before it was just him and Mary, Neil remembered getting excited for his Exy games. The night before them, he wouldn’t be able to sleep, and all day in school he’d be looking forward to that night, to the blinding lights of the court and to the rush of the game. He’d almost forgotten what that felt like.

He didn’t stress over the production the way some of the others did, like Kevin and Dan, who were emotionally invested in the program’s success. He enjoyed the fact that drama was generally a low-stakes environment that he could just spend time in and recharge. However, there was one thing that was still worrying him - that guy Andrew. He and his long sleeves and black armbands were at most of the builds, just as Renee had said he would be, serving his community time or whatnot. The only person he ever talked to was Renee, and he made a point to act like none of the others even existed, but he held a considerable presence nonetheless. Apparently he had established a reputation last year; no one wanted to piss him off, so everyone avoided him. He was a landmine - one wrong step could set him off. That put Neil on edge in a space he was just beginning to think could be free from that, and it he was kinda pissed about it, if he was being honest.

It probably would’ve been fine if Neil had managed to stay out of Andrew’s way, but of course he hadn’t even been able to do that. Just last Saturday, he had been trying to move a particularly awkward mic stand out of its storage in the rafters to the stage, where it would be used as a prop during the play. Apparently the screws were all rusted in place, so it didn’t fold up compact, and Neil was working it around every corner. He was being so spatially aware about the stupid mic stand that he didn’t notice a person behind him painting a set of stairs until he backed up into them on the stage floor and pushed them completely off balance. He straightened, then turned around to apologize, when he quickly noticed that 1) the person was Andrew, and 2) he was holding a knife to Neil’s stomach, neatly out of sight of everyone else.

Neil backed up as fast as he could manage, holding his hands up as much as he was able with the mic stand, trying to let Andrew know that he meant him no harm. Andrew kept a level gaze on Neil for a moment, then deftly slid the knife inside his sleeve and turned back around, resuming painting like nothing had happened. Neil forced himself to inhale; his pulse shook throughout his body. It had been a long time since he’d been threatened with a knife, but he had too many scars to ever forget what that felt like. He gathered himself back together and put the mic stand into place, and for the rest of the day he maintained an orbit around Andrew that was as far away from him as was possible.

He kept tabs on Andrew’s whereabouts, and noticed when he left for the day. So while Neil was helping Renee wash paint off brushes in a messy sink tucked away backstage, he knew he wasn’t being eavesdropped and decided to get her take. After all, someone like her couldn’t be friends with someone like him if she thought he was genuinely dangerous. Or so he hoped.

“You’re friends with Andrew, right? I mean, you've said you are, and he only talks to you,” he pointed out, easing into his question as he handed her another dirty paintbrush.

She took the paintbrush and responded with a bright, “Yes, I consider him a good friend. I hope he feels the same way, but I’ve never really been able to be sure.” She massaged the paint out in the water. “Why, was there something you wanted to ask about him?”

“Sort of. He pulled a knife on me earlier today. I’m ok now, I just don’t if I'm gonna feel safe around him.”

She seemed a bit shocked by that, and gave him a concerned look. “Oh, I’m so sorry you had to experience that, Neil. I know he thought he had to, but he really shouldn’t have done that to you.” She shook water out of the brush, choosing her words. “Yes, I’m his friend, and I meant what I said to Dan about giving him second chances and all, but I’m not about making excuses for him - he makes it exceedingly difficult for people to give him a chance. I’ve told him that, but he doesn’t care.”

“I remember you and Dan talking about whatever he and his brother did last year. I just don’t want to get mixed up in anything like that.” It felt like it would’ve been rude to flat out ask what had happened last year, but he hoped Renee might just tell him anyway. He wanted to know what he was getting into.

Renee sighed, hanging the brush up on a tack in the wall. “His story is not mine to share, but I will let you know that he has done violence, and he has paid for it. I wish I could tell you that he is going to be better this year, or that I'll be able to keep a handle on him, Neil. But he chooses his own actions, as he should. I can only point things out to him and hope that he respects me enough to take my advice. 

“But I will tell you this,” she added, “he is not violent for violence’s sake. He only ever reacts in defense, whether that’s defending himself or those who he considers worth protecting. He is not just some loose cannon. _‘Don’t provoke him,’_ isn’t very useful or responsible advice for me to give you, but it’s the only advice I have. I’m sorry.”

That struck Neil as interesting. He was well-versed in using violence as a means to protect; he saw its logic. It was the senseless violence he never saw coming that scared him. It was a bit of a relief to know that Andrew’s actions had a sense of predictability to them. Neil liked Renee’s honesty: she might be focused on what was good and right, but first and foremost she knew what already _was_ , and she wasn’t going to give Neil any bullshit. “That’s ok,” he assured her. “Like you said, he makes his own choices. I just wanted to get a heads up, but I think you gave me it.” Renee smiled at him, and they finished cleaning the brushes in a peaceful silence.

Neil mulled over what Renee had told him, and at the next set build, he watched Andrew out of observation instead of wariness. He noticed that the boy never moved too close to any of the people crowded onstage, never looked at anyone in a way that would provoke a conversation, even waited for the person next to him to take their brush out of the paint bucket first so he wouldn’t accidentally touch their hand. Neil realized that Andrew was doing the same sorts of things that he too had learned to do, all his years looking over his shoulder and waiting for danger to strike. Every move was designed to keep people away, to go unnoticed, to not touch or interact with another human. Because when no one saw you or felt you or talked to you, you didn’t exist. And if you didn’t exist, you couldn’t be hurt. 

He suddenly saw himself painfully outlined in Andrew’s closed-off form, and Neil understood why the boy had felt the need to pull that knife out. Neil had been a stranger that had not only touched him from behind, but had pushed him and thrown him off his balance. Neil had seen it as an accident, but he realized that if he had been Andrew, he too would’ve reacted like it was an attack. Or at least, the Neil from a few months ago would have. He was slowly but surely becoming a little more trusting, whether or not that went against his better judgement. 

So when he found himself untangling cords next to Andrew later that day, he decided to go out on a limb and apologize. Maybe initiating a conversation with him was a bad idea, but maybe it would make him realize that Neil was not a threat. That could be beneficial. He knew he wasn’t going to catch Andrew’s eye, so he just went for it and said, “Hey, my name’s Neil. I just wanted to say sorry for bumping into you yesterday. It was totally an accident, but I get why you freaked out.”

He hadn’t been expecting any reaction at all, so it took him a few moments to look over and notice that Andrew was staring at him. His expression was guarded, just barely a frown. He didn’t say anything, so Neil went back to working out a knot in the cord. Oh well. He said what he’d wanted to say. Andrew not having anything to say back was probably a good sign. At least he hadn’t taken it as a threat and pulled out another knife. Neil figured that that was enough interaction for the both of them, and he made sure to give Andrew his space for the rest of the day.

*******

And then one day, when he was distracted with daydreams about opening night, they came for him. It was the end of the day, and they slipped into the throngs of students crowding the lobby with ease. They didn’t touch him, which in hindsight Neil appreciated, but they didn’t need to: as soon as two men in expensive suits stepped in front of him, Neil froze in his tracks. He immediately knew what was going on, and he diligently followed them outside. They left the kids boarding their buses behind, and instead walked to a corner of the parking lot where a sleek black car was waiting for them. He got into the backseat after one man and was bookended by the other. He was not going to be able to run, but he tried to remind himself that he shouldn’t need to. The Moriyamas were going to give him a proposal, and no matter what it was he was going to say yes. This should be easy. The truth of that wasn’t making his heart race any less.

They didn’t drive very far. Neil saw them approaching an expensive-looking hotel, the sort that he hadn't thought existed in Alamosa Springs, and they pulled up in front of it. Neil wondered if the Moriyamas owned this place, or if they were so connected that they had contacts even in this small desert town. Or maybe they had just come here for Neil. He shuddered to think that his location was so widely known that it could attract a mob family. The men got out and Neil followed, walking through a set of doors into a lavishly furnished lobby, turning a corner, and stepping into an an elevator gilded with gold. The silence was beyond uncomfortable by now, but Neil felt even more suffocated being crowded in such a small space between two bulky men, a situation that got all his instincts screaming to _get out_. The bell finally dinged at the tenth floor. They exited, and Neil was led down the hall to an office suite. The guard to his right knocked twice, and after a reply in curt Japanese came from the other side, they opened the door for him. Neil supposed he was meant to enter, so he walked in slowly and stopped before an ornate wooden desk, not yet making eye contact with the royal son sitting behind it: Ichirou Moriyama, Head of the Family. Neil had kept up to date on the leadership of the Family all these years - his survival required it. Though he’d been running from his father’s wrath, the Moriyamas were even more fear-inspiring, because even his father reported back to them. Neil panicked for only a second about what etiquette was respectful enough for someone of Ichirou’s standing, and then gave a deep bow, kneeling on one leg, and kept his head down as he waited to see if that was enough. He didn’t bow because it would've been the respectful thing to do in Japanese culture - he bowed because Ichirou was not a ' _Sir_ ' but a ' _Lord_.'

Neil was about to panic, thinking he had chosen the wrong move, when Ichirou said “Stand.” Neil did as he was told. He did not dare to speak first. 

The deceptively youthful man was taking his time filling out some sort of document on the desk, and he made Neil wait until he was finished before even looking up at him. As he gave Neil a once-over, his face gave nothing away. He picked up another stack of papers and started working on them as he spoke: “You have been informed that we have considered your merits as a potential investment, and that we are going to give you an offer; there will be no other offer of this kind again, and there will be no bartering over the details of this offer.”

Neil was waiting for Ichirou to continue until he realized he was supposed to confirm that he understood this. He almost stumbled on his words, but reined himself in; he responded with a composed, “Yes. I have been informed and I understand.”

“Good,” Ichirou said. He wrote a few more things down on his papers, making Neil wait for it. The tactic was working, as Neil was terrified. He was very aware of just how completely Ichirou was holding Neil’s life in his hands. Neil was was standing up straight before the desk, hands clasped behind his back and every muscle taut, fearing the worst. Ichirou said, almost nonchalantly, “You used to play Exy?”

It was so completely not what Neil was expecting to hear that he almost blurted out a “What?” But he did not make such a ridiculous misstep, and simply said, “I did. I was a backliner for a little league team at my father’s instruction.” He felt like he was being led into some sort of trap.

“You know that we own three professional Exy teams as well as one at the college level. We invest heavily into the Exy world, and it provides us with many powerful resources.” Neil actually hadn’t known that, though he’d had a feeling. His father had insisted that Neil be involved in the sport, which was odd considering his lack of concern about the rest of Neil's life, and Neil had memories of strange business people always skirting around the edges of his little league games. Ichirou idly flipped a sheet of paper. “If you can prove that you still have the potential to be a part of this world, you may fulfill yourself as our investment by being one of our professional Exy players. The details would come at a later time; among other things, the majority of your salary would go to the Family.”

This had to be some sort of trap. Was he hearing that right? They were saying that they wanted him to do the one thing in the world that he actually enjoyed, and he just had to give them millions of dollars that he would never use anyway? And here Neil was, thinking he was going to have to be a mob boss like his father. But… _‘if you can prove that you still have the potential.’_ He hadn’t played on a team since he was ten, hadn’t held a racquet since he was fourteen. That meant he had a lot to prove. Ichirou was looking up at him now, his face as cool and closed-off as marble, waiting for Neil to accept.

Neil quickly said, “That would be more than what I deserve, given the trouble I have caused the Family.”

“So you accept the offer,” Ichirou said. It wasn’t a question.

“Yes,” Neil clarified, fearing he had said something wrong. He wouldn’t mess this up.

“Good. I suggest you find an Exy gym and start practicing. You have until January to get your skills up to par; we will observe your progress at that time, and then, if we determine you to be up to our standards, we will have you drafted to a college team. You will play for this team, and then sign on as pro when you graduate.” Neil could hear loud and clear the promise under all of it: if he didn’t meet their expectations at any point along the process, he would be dead.

He answered, “I understand, Lord Moriyama.”

“Then that is all. We will meet with you in January.” Neil couldn’t tell if that was his cue to leave or not, and he was about to try and make a graceful exit when Ichirou spoke again. “When we see you next, do not wear those contacts. You are not in hiding anymore. We know very well who you are.”

Neil was surprised, but hastily nodded and said, “Of course.” That was definitely his cue to leave. He bowed again, then exited the room, trying not to look like he was running. 

The guards didn’t lead him out, but Neil found his way back to the lobby of the hotel just fine. He didn’t quite know what part of town he was in, but that didn’t really matter. He needed a good run: this was a lot to process. He opened the hotel doors and stepped into the dry afternoon, golden sunlight slanting across his face. He started to make his way down the street, figuring he would recognize something eventually from all his runs. 

As he started up a jog, he made a checklist in his head of all the things he needed to do as soon as possible. First, he was going to call Stuart and tell him that his bargaining had been a success, and to thank him once again for everything. Second, he was going to find an Exy gym and sign up for practice slots or a team if they had one - there wasn’t any time to waste on that. Third, he was going to take out his contacts. The Moriyamas didn’t want to see him in them, so he needed to start getting used to his true eyes _now_. If he had been hearing Ichirou correctly, Neil was going to get to go to college. He was going to not only play Exy, but do it professionally. As his job. Neil would do everything in his power to make sure he didn’t ruin this impossibly good scenario.

It would be hard, but he’d meant what he said: it was more than what he deserved. He was aware that he was going to have to earn it. But if there was one thing he knew how to do, it was how to survive when the circumstances were dire. So no matter how impossible this seemed, he was going to make sure he finally got a chance at life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soundtrack - [Paradise by Bad suns](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8whRNI-G8KE)
> 
> 8/7 update: I'm editing the next chapter rn (it's a long one) - just to let you know I haven't forgotten about this fic! I'm just having a hard time writing. Hopefully up soon!


	6. Show Time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> finally, _finally_ finished this chapter. writing's weird, thank you for being patient :)

Nothing in Neil’s life made sense anymore, but that was perfectly okay with him.

It shouldn’t be possible that he was in the auditorium on a Friday afternoon, the day before tech week began, holding a ladder steady for Kevin as they worked on the lights that were hanging from the ceiling. And yet, after all that had happened and all that could have ended horribly, he was still here, still somehow not dead. He could hardly keep up with this version of reality.

The ladder swayed as Kevin leaned forward to reach around the back of one of the lights. It was hanging just slightly too high up. Neil tightened his grip on the ladder and swore under his breath. He wasn’t much in the way of a counterweight, and he certainly was not going to be responsible for Kevin’s tragic death. Kevin didn’t seem to notice and continued fixing the light beam, pointing it to the proper place as per their blueprints. Neil heard the sound of Seth’s voice crackling over Kevin’s headset; Kevin turned towards the booth to glare at him, and Neil saw Seth shrug and hold up his hands.

The two of them were the only ones on the stage at the moment, but Neil could hear Dan and her crew up in the ceiling’s catwalks, securing lights to the beams that hung above the audience. Neil had been up there only once, but after that experience he felt grateful that heights didn’t bother him. Lately Dan had been in full-on theater mode, and Neil had to admit it was rubbing off on him - he was getting a little excited.

Kevin pressed his headset to his ear, listening with a frown. "I am moving it, this is as far as it goes,” he told Seth. A pause. “Well, then there must be something wrong with the plans.” Neil couldn’t make out Seth’s words, but he could tell from the cadence that it was sarcasm. “I swear to God, Seth, if you need me to babysit you I’ll come back there and tell you what to do, but I kind of thought you could handle it on your own.” Neil frowned up at Kevin. He was in a bad mood today, and Neil didn’t appreciate it.

Seth said another thing and Kevin looked like he was about to come down off the ladder, but at that moment Neil heard the sound of the backstage door opening and someone walking down the hall in their direction. Kevin and Neil turned to look, though Neil already had a guess to who it would be. Sure enough, it was the only person missing from their now-regular group: Andrew, striding with purpose onto the stage and looking around, presumably for Renee.

Then Andrew did something strange – he turned towards Neil and spoke. “Where’s everyone else?” he said. His voice carried neither inflection nor emotion.

Neil was so caught off guard that he wasn’t able to answer before Kevin butted in. “Renee and Dan and are with the others up –”

“Don’t talk to me,” Andrew cut him off, surprisingly forceful this time. He stared Kevin down for a good couple of seconds before he turned back to Neil and raised his eyebrows expectantly.

Neil found his voice and said, “They’re up in the catwalks.” Had that apology worked – did Andrew trust him now or something?

Andrew eyed the ceiling, and instead of heading to join Dan’s crew, he took his phone out and started texting. Neil tried to be subtle and watched him out of the corner of his eye. He thought he’d seen wariness flicker over Andrew’s face when he’d looked up. As closed off as Andrew might try to be, Neil was very experienced in noticing small changes in people’s emotions. He’d seen something like fear there.

Kevin didn’t try to say anything else to Andrew, and after a few moments he decided to move the ladder a couple of feet to the left. As Neil helped him, Andrew’s phone buzzed, and upon reading it he turned and walked back the way he’d come. Neil watched him leave, and he considered the glare he’d seen Andrew give Kevin a few weeks ago. What the hell had happened between them? He wondered about it as Kevin continued working in silence.

Dan and the rest of the crew eventually came down from the ceiling, and as Neil saw them approaching he suddenly remembered that he and Dan had not met face-to-face that day. He braced himself for what he knew was about to come. Dan wasn’t one for concealed reactions, and sure enough, she did a full-on double take when she made eye contact with Neil.

“Neil, your eyes!” she said, and of course when she did everyone else looked at him to see what she was talking about. _Best to get it all over with now_ , Neil figured, tired of the conversation he’d had a million times already at school.

“Yeah, I know. My prescription changed and I decided not to use colored contacts anymore.” He had perfect vision, but it was an easy lie.

“Wait,” Dan started, and Neil could see her working to make sense of what he’d just said. “Wait, you mean those are your natural eyes? And you were covering them up before?”

Neil nodded, like he had to everyone else who’d expressed the same shock that day. Dan was obviously confused. “Why? Your eyes are so beautiful natural! I’d kill for eyes like that!”

 _Kill_. Neil sighed. “I just didn’t like them.” That was technically true, and he really didn’t owe anyone more explanation than that. “Let’s not talk about it anymore though, don’t you have some set stuff to worry about?” 

He tried to not be rude about it, but Dan obviously got the message that this was a sensitive issue. “Yes, yes we do,” she said, turning towards the others and clapping her hands, signalling to them to get to work. Everyone got to setting up their work stations, and no one else pushed the subject. Neil sighed, glad this day was finally over. All the attention for his “new” eyes had been like rubbing an open wound over and over again. A small price to pay for his continued survival, but still.

He helped Kevin not die on the ladder as they continued to arrange each hanging light onstage, until finally Dan came back from the parking lot carrying a stack of hot pizza boxes - dinner at last. The crew abandoned what they were doing and crowded around the food eagerly, grabbing paper plates and cups and pizza slices and sitting down in a circle around each other. To his surprise, Neil found Andrew there as well, sitting next to Renee and looking at his slice warily. Neil had thought he’d left, but from the sawdust on his black clothes it seemed as though he’d just been doing work backstage.

Kevin and Dan were chatting about midterms in between bites, Allison was making Renee laugh with a wild story, but Neil was watching Andrew. The boy took off all the cheese on his pizza in one slab and placed it to the side on a napkin, then ripped the sauced crust into small chunks and placed them in his mouth one by one. He was an odd one, but Neil wasn’t put off. On the contrary, he was intrigued.

The group devoured four pizzas in no time, and everyone cleaned up quickly and got back to work as they were trying to finish it all by the end of the night – after all, tech week started tomorrow. Neil was excited to finally see this all put together, but he was also worried about getting enough time for Exy. He’d found a gym, had savored picking out a new racquet, and had gotten in several hours of practice already, but there were only two months left to get his Exy skills up to par in order to impress the Moriyamas, and that was a wide gap to close in very little time. He had committed to the play, so he was going to keep going, but there was little chance he’d be able to fit theater in next marking period. As for the spring musical...well, he wasn’t letting himself think that far ahead yet, just in case.

Kevin and Seth went to the booth to bunker down and program their boards with cues, so Neil joined Dan’s crew in painting the remaining set pieces. He sat down with a paint can and a brush on the chipped wood floor of the stage and got to work painting some roses on the Romeo and Juliet trellis. Dan assured him that it didn’t need to be perfect, which was a relief - he was not much of an artist.

After a few minutes, someone dropped their paint can down next to him, and Neil looked up to see that it was Andrew. Surprised, Neil was silent as the other boy sat down, and they worked quietly for a few moments until, for the second time that day, Andrew spoke to him.

“I thought your eyes were brown,” he said, quite matter-of-fact. Andrew was looking towards the vine he was painting, but he was clearly addressing Neil.

“What?” Neil responded intelligently. The two other people working on the trellis were not-so-subtly eavesdropping, probably shocked to be hearing Andrew’s voice.

“You’re eyes are blue now,” Andrew continued, ignoring any looks he was getting. “Did you not notice?”

“No, I mean, I know," Neil answered. For some reason when it was Andrew asking this question, it didn't bother him to answer it again, and he felt himself being pulled towards honesty. They had some kind of connection now, he supposed. "I used to wear contacts. Now I’m not.”

Andrew still didn’t look at him. “Did your eyesight magically improve overnight? That’s quite the miracle – you should be celebrating.” He delivered the line like a joke, but he wasn’t laughing.

Neil didn’t quite know how to respond. He'd already just told him more truth than he was comfortable with, but he didn't want to lie and push Andrew away. “I just can’t wear them anymore,” he said finally. “That’s all.”

They were silent for a moment, then Neil had another thought. “I didn’t think you paid attention to anyone else enough to notice something like that.”

That got Andrew to finally look over at him, his expression almost a grimace. “Dan screaming about it was enough to get me to pay attention. And unfortunately my brain does not discriminate between the necessary and the meaningless facts it remembers. Don’t think you’re special.” He turned back to his painting.

Andrew had a funny way of talking; he was a weird kid. Neil smiled a little to himself, getting back to painting his own rose. Here he was, scared that Andrew would be a serious threat, and now it seemed as if Neil had already won him over. Andrew could say all the mean words he wanted, but the fact that he was talking to Neil at all meant that Neil wasn’t a threat to him. And that was good news for them both.

Neil wished he could ask him about what happened last year, but he wasn't going to push it. Eventually Andrew got up and left, and Neil understood that he’d only come over to ask about his eyes, which Neil could understand. It’d be a weird thing to see a change as dramatic as that, and it would've had his paranoia acting up too.

By the end of the night most of the set had been completed, and Dan let them go early, assuring them that they were actually on time this year, as rare as that was. The crew was tired but buzzing with excited energy, the first performance being just around the corner. Neil had gotten roped into splitting some of the sound responsibilities with Seth, and so as everyone was waiting for their rides, Seth was giving him the run down on the mics. "These are the body mics that the actors use - the tip here is the mic part, and the batteries are in the pack which is strapped under their clothing..."

Neil wasn’t really listening to what Seth was saying, more interested in watching Andrew by the doors, talking to Renee. Neil could hear Renee say “It was so nice to see you – you’ll be back for the winter one-acts, right?” He couldn’t hear Andrew’s response, but he assumed it was in the affirmative because Renee responded, “Great. See you tomorrow in Math!” and carried her bag out the door.

Neil had forgotten for a minute that Andrew was technically just here for the service hours, and that that meant he wasn’t going to do the fun parts - rehearsals and performances. That meant Neil probably wouldn’t see Andrew ever again as they didn’t have any classes together. All that trust work for nothing; it had felt like they were building something.

“Are you listening to me, man? This is important,” Seth said, waving a hand in front of Neil’s face.

Neil pulled back with a frown. “I got it, I’ll be careful.”

“You better be – do you know how much these things cost?” Seth stroked the mic pack, demonstrating how to be careful. “If anything happens to them, even if it’s my fault, I’m blaming you, and then you’ll have Wymack to deal with.”

Neil waved him off with a “Yeah ok,” and looked back at Andrew, catching him glance at his phone and then leave the theater without a sound. With Seth’s lecture over, he figured it was time for him to leave as well. He walked home in the dark, the moonlight shining bright on the scrubgrass that lined the sidewalk, and when he finally laid down in his small bed, he fell asleep easily, glad to put his thoughts to rest.

******

Neil managed to get an Exy practice in before tech the next day, and he was feeling very accomplished as he headed into the school building at 11 am. It had been hot as ever outside, but the auditorium was like a cool, dark cave. Only the stage lights were on, illuminating the actors milling around, chatting and laughing with each other as they waited to be told where to go. As his eyes adjusted to the dark, he could make out Kevin and Seth at their posts in the booth, one red-colored lamp giving them enough light to read the script. Neil climbed up the stage steps, looking for Dan and the crew, when suddenly he heard someone bounding towards him.

“Neil! We’re finally together!” Neil turned around but he was too late to stop Matt from catching him in a fierce shoulder hug. He flinched, and Matt seemed to notice, because he pulled back and said, “Oh, my bad bro, didn’t mean to scare you.” He looked at Neil with concern. “You good?”

Neil nodded. He didn’t like being grabbed for obvious reasons, but he told Matt, “I’m fine.”

Matt looked relieved, and he said, “Alright, cool, just checking. I’m just so pumped that we’re finally all here, we’ve only been talking about this for like two months.”

Neil had to smile. “Yeah, it better be everything you’ve hyped it up to be.”

Matt laughed at that, clearly glad to see Neil’s sense of humor. “Well, don’t blame me if today’s boring. Sometimes cue-to-cue is slow as hell - I hope you brought homework. After the first show night, then you’re allowed to tell me if I was wrong, alright?”

“Alright,” Neil responded. He hadn’t brought any homework. This better not be a waste of his Exy time. As he started to worry, Abby called out from the stage for Matt, as he was needed for the next scene.

“Gotta go, but I’ll be back to hang out in between cues. If you’re looking for Dan, she was by the loading docks when I last saw her.” Matt pointed to the back, then made to go back onstage, but turned around and said, “And hey, I like all this.” He gestured to his eyes, clearly meaning Neil’s, and Neil was suddenly conscious of his uncovered eyes. He had totally forgotten that Matt had never seen them. “It’s a good look.” He winked at Neil, then jogged off to find his position on stage. Neil was surprised but grateful that he hadn’t made a big deal out of it. Maybe Dan had said something, or maybe Matt was just a nice person.

He ventured backstage and found Dan and some crew members dusting off their hands and catching their breath, closing the loading dock doors behind a huge set piece that they’d apparently lifted from the ground below. Neil saw Renee picking a wood chip out of a friend’s hair, and he found himself looking for Andrew beside her, but of course he wasn’t there. 

Dan said, “Thanks for your help guys. Now, let’s talk about how today’s gonna go.” Everyone formed a semi-circle around her to listen, and Neil filed in next to the others. Dan rifled through a big binder she was holding, stuffed with almost a whole ream of paper that Neil guessed was probably the script, until she found the spot she was looking for. 

“Right, Abby’s coming up to the first set change, so you’ll get to practice that today at least, and I want you guys to listen to Renee and Chelsea about how you’re supposed to do it – they’ve been here since the beginning and they know how it goes. I’m gonna be mostly in communication with the tech guys all day to make sure we have the cues lined up right, but your jobs will be on the stage. That means spiking props, that means practicing rolling that trellis with the bad wheel,” a few people groaned, “yeah, I know it’s annoying, but that’s why you need to practice. If we’re lucky we’ll get to the halfway mark by the end of the day, but we might not even get that far - you know how these things go. What you can do is get to know the script, and take notes if it helps. Renee has a copy you can look at, but if any of you want one of your own we can certainly print one out for you.”

She closed the binder with a snap and gave them a determined smile. “You guys are gonna do great. Now, no more standing around – let’s get to it!” Everyone gave a little “first day of tech!” cheer, and then they split up to work on their individual projects. Neil had a lot to learn about how the theater worked, but if he was anything he was a fast learner, and in no time he felt like a member of their team. They “spiked” the props into place, which marked in neon tape where the furniture props went onstage so that they’d be placed in the right spot every time, in line with the actors and the lights. Dan was in constant communication with Kevin over her headset as they moved slowly from “cue-to-cue,” making sure that each scene had the correct lights programmed into the board, and that Dan had every one noted in her master script so that she could keep them on track. The actors worked steadily towards being “off book,” only looking at the script when they forgot a line or two.

Even though there were no costumes, and actors kept forgetting lines, and they had to stop every five seconds to fix something, Neil was able to actually get a sense for what the play was going to be like. It looked interesting enough, though Neil still didn’t get any of the Shakespeare references. Apparently Matt was one of three main narrators, and he was onstage more often than not. The longest Neil got to hang out with him was during one particularly long tech break when the projector started spazzing and they all took a break for maintenence (i.e., Kevin). 

Matt lounged on a set piece backstage with Neil, and they got to talking about Exy. Neil had told him and Dan in study hall that he was having to practice it a ton because he was trying to make a college team, which wasn’t exactly a lie, and Matt had mentioned that he used to play as a kid. Now they were having fun talking about favorite teams and positions, and Matt offered to spar with Neil sometime. “It’s much more useful to practice against someone, and I used to be pretty good!” he said genuinely. 

“That’d be nice,” Neil said, and he meant it. “After the play though.”

“Oh, definitely,” Matt responded as Allison and Renee came up to join them.

“You two jocking out about Exy?” Allison asked, her script tucked under her arm.

“Ahh, ignore her Neil. Allison’s one of us; she played on the same little league team as I did when we were in elementary school,” Matt said, grinning in Allison’s direction.

“I didn’t know you played Exy!" Renee said, nudging Allison and giving her a smile. "It's kind of a rough sport, I'm impressed."

“Oh, it wasn't that bad, the boys who play it are just drama queens,” Allison said, shrugging but concealing a grin. “Speaking of, don’t let Kevin hear you saying the ‘E’ word.”

“Yeah, he’d derail the whole production just to talk about _Jeremy Knox_ ,” Matt cooed, and they all laughed. Dan was able to step away for just a moment, and she showed the group a video she’d taken of Seth wearing sunglasses as the lights he’d programmed strobed around him, but soon enough she was needed again. The actors were called back to their places too, and Neil went back to the stage crew to wait for their next set change.

Sick of waiting, someone pulled up a professional recording of the play on [Youtube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqmfrqAVeK0) to pass the time. Neil joined the crew people watching it over their shoulders, and he liked finally seeing what this whole thing was going to look like in the end. And it was actually funny. Neil was interested to see what they were going to keep and what they were going to do differently.

They were let off before dinner that day, having gotten through half a run-through of the play. Dan and Kevin and Abby stayed behind to do some last minute fixes, and Neil left with everyone else, the sun just about to set. Once he got home he was strangely bored, with no Exy or theater to keep him occupied. And no paranoia, either. That was the strangest thing to be missing, but he was very thankful for its lack.

********

The rest of tech week was a lot of fun, every day ramping up more excitement and stress as they got closer to opening night. Everything had to be working by Thursday, but Dan assured them that it would be fine. Neil let the others be stressed for him, he was just happy to be there. 

The big day came faster than he’d expected, the week having gone by in a blur of Exy and homework and hanging out with his friends. Backstage buzzed with energy the night of the first performance, and fairy lights glowed over the heads of the actors and crew whispering in the wings. Periodically they would peek out from behind the curtain to see how big the audience was getting, and Neil was surprised to see how many people actually showed up. He'd secretly held the assumption that no one would really come, and that they were mostly doing it for themselves and the friends and family that were obligated to come, but that didn’t seem to be true. Dan had done a lot of promo, hanging posters up in the classrooms of all her favorite teachers and telling everyone she knew to come, and it seemed to have worked. He recognized a few faces from his classes in the crowd before Dan was shooing them back behind the curtain.

A few minutes before start, everyone gathered in the band room for a pep meeting. The stage crew and tech and all the actors and Abby grouped together in a big circle, and Abby said a few words about how proud she was of them and how they were going to do great. Matt and some of the other seniors got emotional talking about how this was their last fall play, and Neil wondered if this would be his last time in theater as well. Dan tried to act like she wasn’t crying and gave one last reminder not to step on the cords backstage. They put all their hands in the middle of the circle, gave a cheer, and then the show was a go. 

Neil followed the procession of theater kids out the door and into the dark of the backstage. Everyone was dressed in black, and as they took the steps single file, it felt a lot like Exy: everyone coming together as one team as they walked onto the court. Neil grinned. He was beginning to like this a little too much.

The performance began, and the energy was electric. The stagehands worked together as one entity, moving around each other fluidly in the dark, silently hauling set pieces and getting the right props into the right hands. Neil could hear the audience even though he couldn’t see them, hundreds of people waiting and breathing in the dark. He was great at this job, which made sense, considering that he'd been raised to be invisible.

Dan was running the show from her post backstage, a book light clipped to her binder as she gave the tech people their cues over the headsets. She was a born leader, Neil could tell. Authoritative but not overbearing, she reminded him of the Exy coach he’d had in middle school; that coach had been his favorite. Neil fantasized about what position she’d be if she played Exy. Maybe a goalie; probably a captain. He smiled. Maybe in another life.

He only caught snippets of the show, and he was glad he’d watched that recording online for context. He at least liked the part where they spoofed Macbeth: they put on ridiculous Scottish accents (Neil would know - he’d lived there briefly), and they had painted the face of the scottish-accented ogre, Shrek, on the set behind them. Neil actually got that joke, as he’d seen the movie in class once, many years ago. He thought it was a good movie, but he hadn’t realized that it’d become such a big thing.

Intermission gave them a chance to catch their breath, though Neil was ready to keep going. He was like that in Exy too, able to go and go without getting tired. Coaches had warned him that it was a bad habit, fearing that he would over-exert himself and get hurt. With the life Neil had lived though, it didn’t seem like a bad thing at all. He joined the stage crew kids hanging out by the curtains and looked out again to see if he recognized anyone new. To his shock his eyes fell on a short blonde boy, just two rows from the front, studying the phone in his lap.

Neil had gotten the distinct impression that Andrew didn’t care at all about theater, and he never would’ve expected him to spend money to come see the show. Dan had just returned from the concession tables and she walked over to them, handing out soft pretzels to the crew. As Neil accepted one from her, he said, “Did you see that Andrew’s here?”

She gave a short humorless laugh, and without even looking out into the crowd said, “It’s not him, I can tell you right now. It’s Aaron, his twin. Andrew would literally never.” She took a bite of her pretzel and shook her head.

Renee was standing next to them, and she clarified: “Aaron is dating Katelyn - she’s one of the actors. He comes to all her shows.”

“Andrew probably thinks we’re too lame for him. Not like he helps us out every year or anything,” Dan huffed. "It’s opening night though, I don’t want to talk about him. I’m going to find Abby." She nodded towards their group. "Remember, we’re back in three minutes.”

Neil looked again onto the crowd, a little embarrassed to have been fooled so easily. How could he have forgotten Andrew had a twin? As he watched Aaron get out of his seat and walk out towards the lobby, it was clear that that was a different person - the body language was all different. He wondered if he’d ever seen Aaron in the hallway on their way to class and assumed it was Andrew. Neil frowned at the thought. He’d never liked twins: they were unnerving.

They moved quickly into the second act, and then before Neil knew it they were finished. The curtains came down and everyone congratulated each other on an opening night well done. The actors congregated in the lobby, smiling warmly through their stage makeup and thanking their friends and family for coming to see them, and Neil helped Seth collect their mics. Some actors remembered to hand theirs in, but the rest Neil was sent out to go collect. The lobby was stuffed to the brim with chatter and bodies, but Neil navigated through it with practiced ease. As he tracked down each actor one by one, he realized with surprise that he was actually starting to learn some of their names.

He got back and put all the mics away, and since Seth didn’t have any snide comments about his mic handling, he figured he was doing it alright. He helped turn off the speakers at the back of the stage and check that all the props were accounted for, and then it was a wrap for the night. Neil got home and collapsed into bed, ready to do it all over again the next day. School, Exy, theater, repeat. Homework be damned.

******

By the second performance the actors were getting comfortable with their roles and were lighting up the stage. Neil was getting more comfortable too, and he’d been thinking. He could probably do the winter production, which wasn’t even a whole show, just a few short “one-act” plays. This week hadn’t been too bad, and actually, because he was finally getting to do things he enjoyed again, he was filled with renewed energy in all aspects of his life. He got schoolwork done in a timely manner so that he wouldn’t have to do it after theater, and he practiced hard during his time in the Exy gym, conscious of how little time he had left. He had forgotten what it felt like to enjoy life, and he didn’t want to give that up any time soon.

By the last performance that Saturday evening, he knew he’d found something special. Maybe it was somewhere around the time when Matt’s mic started going on the fritz. As his words began to cut in and out, Neil glanced over to see Dan already on it, talking quickly over the headsets. She met Neil’s eyes and waved him over.

“Operation ‘Save Matt’ time. I need you to go to the booth and get a new mic from Seth - the two of them are tied up for the next few scenes so they can’t do it themselves.” She indicated the path to take outside the auditorium and Neil went off, going down the band hallway as fast as he could without actually sprinting. The lights were harsh compared to the darkness backstage, but except for the auditorium the place was deserted, and Neil felt a certain freedom that he’d never felt in a school building before.

He opened the auditorium doors as quietly as he could and snuck back through the dark to Kevin and Seth. Their faces were illuminated by the soft glow of the operating boards, hundreds of little dials and sliders speaking a language Neil didn't know. Seth had a mic ready for him and he shoved it into Neil’s hands, practically pushing him away. Neil left as he had come, slipping back into the bright lights of the empty lobby. This time he did run: down the band hallway, up the stairs into the back of the stage, all the way to Dan’s waiting hands with Matt right there, ready to do the switch-out. The actors moved to let him run past them, and Neil’s hands shook a little as he helped tape the new wire on Matt, he was so giddy. This was feeling like Exy more and more every day, and he loved it.

Maybe he knew he'd found something special when he’d had lunch with the whole cast earlier that afternoon. Everyone gathered in the cafeteria, which was empty except for the hoard of theater kids. The parents had arranged the whole lunch, and a hundred starving teenagers descended on the food with glee. Matt and Dan sat with their friends at one table, and Neil was welcomed in as one of their group. During school he didn’t share his lunch period with either Matt or Dan, and though he never sat alone, he never sat with friends either. He was good at finding acquaintances to stick with for safety, but this was totally different. As he laughed at one of their inside jokes, he was astonished to think that this was what having friends was supposed to be like. Had he really been missing out on this his whole life? He felt physically safe being surrounded by people that he liked, and he'd certainly never felt that before. Here, on a sunny afternoon in a small town in the middle of Arizona, he didn’t feel like a runaway anymore. The next time he laughed, it felt as if he was taking back the childhood he’d never had, one small piece of joy at a time. 

And maybe it was when the very last performance was over and they’d finished a quick clean up of the set and props, when the actors had changed out of their costumes and were wiping makeup off their faces, when Abby and Kevin were turning off the auditorium lights and Dan was walking out the door with Neil. “You really sure you don’t want to come to the cast party?” she asked for only the third time. 

“ _Dann_ ,” Neil said, giving her a look as he slung his bag over his shoulder.

“I know, just had to be sure. It’ll be a lot of fun, but it’d be more fun with you there,” she said, kicking the door stopper out of the way and letting the door close behind her. “I get it, you’re not a super social person, but remember that I texted you the address of the restaurant if you change your mind.” 

She stopped in front of the outside doors, and he thought she was waiting for Abby and Kevin, but she turned to Neil. “So, was I right?”

He was lost. “About?”

“About theater. Was it a good idea?”

Neil couldn’t help himself. He grinned, whole. “Yeah. Yeah, it was.” He paused for a second, considering. “Such a great idea that I might just have to do it again next time.”

Dan’s smile was both mischievous and proud. “Hell. Fucking. Yeah. I can’t wait - it’s gonna be great, I promise.” She stuck out her hand and gave him a fistbump, which Neil returned with a smirk.

Kevin and Abby finally joined them, and they all went out into the parking lot. Dan got into Matt’s car and Neil waved them goodbye. He got in his own car, but not before looking up at the sky and marveling at all the stars he could see this late at night. 

If theater was something he enjoyed, that was a good thing. Life was only so long, and Neil’s was destined to be short anyway. He resolved to hold onto this as long as possible.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yeah, I know this is like an alternate universe high school musical, so what
> 
> Soundtrack - [Outright by Wild Party](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygLy1FSNEAA)


End file.
